Norms in Sports Contests: The Tour De France

Abstract

Profit-maximizing organizers of sports contests have an incentive to implement rules that increase the attractiveness of sports contest for spectators. But prohibitively high enforcement costs can prevent organizers from implementing certain rules. We argue that in these instances unofficial norms can potentially complement the official rules and add to the attractiveness of a contest. If contest participants face low enough monitoring and sanctioning costs, they can enforce unofficial norms among themselves. We provide evidence in support of our contention from the Tour de France.

Keywords: contest theory, sports contests, norms, Tour de France, rules

JEL Classification: L83, D02, D23